Every coming-to-America story is unique, whether accomplished by crawling through rat-infested tunnels or embarking under the protection of powerful allies, whether its mileage encompasses continents or a 30-minute puddle-jump, whether fueled by the conditions of its departure or those of its destination. Our narrator may smile as she recounts the "mostly true" tale of her own migration from her Caribbean island home to the Florida coast, but don't make the mistake of thinking her ordeal any less fraught with risk than what we see today.
In 1970, Jamaica suffered civil unrest characterized by armed men seizing property and bullying civilians. Its location led to the United States sending spies to monitor the growing amity between Jamaica and Communist Cuba. This is how 18-year-old Kingston secretary Debbie Phillips meets handsome young CIA agent Jack Wallingsford, whose duties include weekly trips stateside. When you're eighteen, danger is an adventure to be embraced, so when Debbie's boss finds himself in need of a courier to smuggle a large sum of money into the U.S. in defiance of travel embargoes, the would-be Yankee Doodle Dandita sees a means of gaining entrance to the land of her dreams. Her border-crossing begins with persuading her employer to provide her a visa and walking-around money. Next, she apprises her boyish swain of an innocuous errand calling for her to join him on his next hop to Miami. They make plans to rendezvous at the Montego Bay airport, and, after bidding goodbye to her mother, (whom she will miss) and her father (whom she will not), Debbie sets out to drive the length of the island—a 100-mile odyssey over rugged terrain whose obstacles include precarious country roads, ganja-smoking cabbies, rural buses laden with farmers transporting produce to market and a hotel/brothel where she is forced to flee barefoot from a would-be rapist. The playbill claims that a film adaptation of Debra Ehrhardt's solo show is under way, but no amount of scenic embellishment could possibly create images more vivid than those conjured by the author as she deftly switches voices and stances to depict a dazzling variety of personalities befitting a journey of no return. By the time her resolution is rewarded by successful completion of her mission (dispensing with the contraband hidden in the suitcase carried unobstructed through customs by the chivalrous and unsuspecting Jack), so emotionally engaged have we become that spontaneous cheers broke out in the house on opening night. You go, girl!
